


No More Wasted Time

by theartofbeinganerd



Series: The One Thing That Won't Change [2]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Because I Can't Not Write Fluff Okay, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, LMDs, Season Four Hopes and Dreams, Wedding/Eloping, also a bit of, bit of, but not really, more like, season four speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-30
Updated: 2016-08-30
Packaged: 2018-08-11 22:58:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7910848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theartofbeinganerd/pseuds/theartofbeinganerd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Jemma finds herself cut off from the rest of the team and up against a whole host of LMDs with the faces of her friends and most importantly, Fitz, it leads her to make a snap decision regarding their engagement and the wedding they've been planning for months - a snap decision that they'll need Coulson's help in making a reality.</p>
<p>*Set sometime during Season 4, entirely speculation on my part</p>
<p>**First part of the series doesn't need to be read first to understand this one</p>
            </blockquote>





	No More Wasted Time

**Author's Note:**

> So, just a few things: Coulson has been at some point reinstated as director, because it makes my life easier and I can't imagine that the new director will be around for long (and I just know already that I'm going to miss Coulson as director); also, this is the wedding/elopement referenced in my other fic "Second Time's the Charm", but you don't have to have read that to understand this! 
> 
> Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy!

“Oh bloody _hell_.”

With a sense of despair washing over her, Jemma took a step back into the lab she’d been directed to by Coulson when they’d stormed the facility. Her hand clenched on the doorframe as she watched with a mix of disbelief and horror as the members of her team surrounded her escape route, fists or guns raised at the ready.

“How many LMDs do they _have_?” she grumbled to herself, shaking her head as she backed up another few steps. She’d heard reports from the others about similar sightings before the comms had been cut, and she could only imagine what the number must be. Taking a deep breath, she patted her pocket to make sure the flashdrive was still there, then pulled the gun out of the back her waistband and readied herself to fight like hell. “None of you have _earned_ the right to those faces!” And with that, she took aim and shot the Daisy LMD in the forehead.

It went down quick, and Jemma felt a lick of satisfaction, but then the others just stepped over it carelessly, their narrowed gazes locked on her. She felt her breath catch in her throat at the sight of Fitz’s beloved face on some _android_ , staring at her with a hatred she’d once believed she deserved from him.

“Right then.” She shot off another few rounds, but the LMDs were made specifically to learn and adapt, so they skillfully dodged the bullets until she had no more. Releasing a harsh breath, she tossed the useless gun aside and hopped over the nearest lab table, hoping for cover as she tried to think up a quick plan out of this. Absently, she twisted the shiny silver ring that had been sitting on her left hand for months now as she mentally ran through her options.

Eventually, she came to the conclusion that her only choices were to wait it out, hoping someone else would come along, or to fight her way out. Immediately, she decided that she was done being saved and putting others at risk in the process, so she sprung up out of her hiding place, sliding over the lab table to catch the Coulson LMD in the chest with her feet.

It stumbled with the force of her kick, but it wasn’t enough to cause it to lose its balance, and Jemma swore under her breath as they just kept advancing. For a moment, she wanted to shout at them, to demand to know why they hadn’t just taken aim at her already, but since she had an inkling that it had to do with needing her alive for some awful reason, she held her tongue and jumped off the table, ducking down to avoid a punch thrown by the May LMD.

She let out a choked off scream when an axe abruptly embedded itself into the marble floor beside her, and she scrambled back on her hands and knees as her gaze shot up to the Mack LMD with an empty look in his eyes. Desperately, she looked around for a weapon, something – _anything_ – to defend herself with.

With a soft “a- _ha_ ”, she jumped up, dashing across the room while dodging strikes from the LMDs. With a cry of victory, she yanked a fire extinguisher from the wall and spun back around in time to catch an unsuspecting Bobbi LMD with it. It fell to the ground with the force of the hit, but was back up in moments, swinging its batons threateningly.

“Oh come _on_ ,” Jemma hissed, taking another desperate swing with the fire extinguisher. She gasped when it was caught in mid-air, and her gaze shot up to find Fitz’s familiar blue eyes looking at her in concern.

“Jemma,” he murmured, and his voice was soft and intimate, like it was when it was just the two of them, cuddled close under warm and cozy covers on a weekend morning. But, this _wasn’t_ Fitz, and she shook it off, blinking rapidly to force back the tears. “Jemma, please, it’s me,” he pleaded, his brow creasing and his eyes widening. “It’s okay.”

“No,” Jemma argued, shaking her head and squeezing her eyes shut briefly. “No, you’re not him. You’re not.”

“Jemma, I love you,” he whispered, and her eyes sprung open. “I love you, please stop.”

Coulson had warned them, had insisted that the LMDs would use their personal connections against them, had cautioned them to not trust anyone. She _knew_ it wasn’t really Fitz, but her heart just couldn’t seem to accept it.

“Can’t you tell it’s me?” the _thing_ with Fitz’s face asked, and there was hurt lacing his voice that caused her to flinch. “Jemma, please, we’ve spent every moment of every day together since we met, can’t you tell it’s me?”

Abruptly, Jemma straightened, and her eyes narrowed as she yanked back the fire extinguisher from his grip. With an almost primal yell, she swung it forward, smashing into the LMD’s head with enough force to knock it back into a metal filing cabinet. She threw in another hit to head for good measure, before informing it coldly, “As much as I wish that were true, it _isn’t_ , you face-stealing bastard.”

There were still a few LMDs in the room, who had apparently been waiting to see if the Fitz LMD’s deception worked, and Jemma spun back to them with a determined expression. With the aid of the gun she’d taken off of the Fitz LMD, she managed to get in a few good hits, enough to allow her to escape the lab, slamming and locking the door behind her.

She’d just barely cleared the hallway before she heard footsteps approaching from an adjoining one. Quickly, she raised the stolen gun, pressing herself up against the wall until she heard the footsteps grow closer. Sucking in a breath, she spun around the corner, leveling her gun with steady hands.

Her eyebrows darted up when she found herself staring down the barrel of a gun – and behind that, Fitz’s eyes.

Swallowing heavily, Jemma narrowed her eyes in determination. No matter how many times they pulled this trick, she wasn’t falling for it. “I _will_ shoot you.”

“Likewise,” he ground out, his expression cold and hard.

Jemma felt a trickle of confusion at that, because why wasn’t this LMD trying to get on her good side, trying to convince her that he was _her_ Fitz? It didn’t make any sense at all.

But, then she saw his hand shake, just the tiniest bit, and her eyes grew wide as she gasped, immediately dropping her gun and holding up her hands. “Fitz!” she cried, sagging a bit in relief. “Oh, it’s really you!”

However, Fitz didn’t waver, his gun still pointed directly at her heart. “That’s not going to work on me, you monster.”

Her heart sunk when she realized that Fitz thought this was all a mind game being played by an LMD with her face, but she steeled herself against the wave of sadness and focused on figuring out the best way to get Fitz to believe it was her. “You’re my best friend in the world and _more_ than that. I love you, even if it took me far too long to realize it. I’m going to marry you, and we’re going to settle down in Perthshire.” Fitz’s hands twitched, as though he wanted to lower the gun, and his eyes softened a bit, so Jemma took a breath and went on, “We’ve been best friends for over twelve years. We met at the Academy, where we became friends despite how much you hated me when we first met.”

Abruptly, Fitz’s gaze hardened and his grip on his gun tightened, even though Jemma had _no_ idea what she’d said that had caused such a reaction. When she caught sight of his finger squeezing down on the trigger, she had barely a moment to dodge, throwing herself against the wall as the bullet sailed past her.

“Fitz!” she gasped, her eyes growing huge in her disbelief. “What are you _doing_?!”

“I _never_ hated Jemma,” he spat through gritted teeth, advancing on her with a steely look in his eyes.

Despite the threat of her fiancé shooting her to death, Jemma was pulled up short at that, and she couldn’t help but gape up at him. “Yes you _did_! Ugh, _Fitz_! You were always competing with me and making a point to answer questions before me and absolutely _refused_ to speak to me! We were rivals until you realized that we were smarter together!”

“ _What_? No!” Fitz was clearly taken aback, his eyebrows high on his forehead, and he seemed to forget himself and the situation as well. “I was _shy_! I had no bloody clue what to say to you! God, I wanted to _impress_ you so I wouldn’t look like a damn idiot in front of the smartest person I’d ever met!”

“You… _what_?” Jemma leaned back against the wall, dazed in her shock as she looked back on all their interactions at the Academy with new eyes. “Oh my _god_. Fitz! I…oh _god_ , I’m so sorry!” Anxiously, she raised her hands to either side of her neck, despair settling over as she remembered the venom in her words as she’d spoken to her parents on the phone about him in those first few weeks at the Academy. All while he’d been trying to find something to say to her! She jumped a bit when she heard the sound of the gun dropping to the ground, but barely had a moment to process it before she was being pulled into Fitz’s achingly familiar embrace.

“Oh god Jem, oh god,” he whispered against her shoulder, hugging her almost painfully tight against him. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m _so_ sorry.”

“Shh, Fitz, it’s alright,” she soothed, reaching up to stroke his sweat-dampened curls comfortingly. “It’s okay, they tried to trick me too.”

“I tried to _kill_ you,” he mumbled, his tone filled with distress and a sharp hatred directed at himself as he buried his face in the crook between her neck and shoulder. “I _shot_ at you.” When she felt the warmth of his tears on her skin, she gently pushed him back a bit so that she could see his face. His expression was one of pure misery and regret, and his chin trembled as his watery eyes landed on her face.

Reaching up to frame his face in her hands, she wiped away his tears with her thumbs as she shushed him again. “Shh, it’s okay. I’m alright, Fitz. You haven’t hurt me. You’d never hurt me.”

“But I _tried_ to,” he reminded her angrily, his jaw clenching beneath her hands.

“You were just doing what Coulson told us to, Fitz,” Jemma insisted, shaking her head. “He told us not to trust anyone.”

“But _you_ knew, you knew it was me.” He sniffled, shaking his head and attempting to back away from her, but she held fast to him, refusing to let him wallow in self-hatred any longer.

“Because I _know_ you, just as you know me.” Despite the situation, she felt her lips quirking up into a tiny smile. “As soon as I started arguing with you, you knew it was me. It’s on me for thinking the wrong thing for all these years. Which we will be having an extensive conversation about later, by the way. But, the important thing is that we know each other, better than anyone else ever has or ever _could_.” Giving him a soft, loving smile, she dropped one of her hands to rest over his heart, which she could feel beating wildly through his shirt. “I wouldn’t agree to marry just anyone, you know.”

Fitz seemed for a moment as though he was determined to hold onto his anger with himself, but then he sighed, relaxing a bit in her grip and raising his hand to mirror her, placing his palm over her similarly racing heart. “I know, I know. I’m sorry, Jemma.”

“Don’t be,” she whispered soothingly, stroking his cheek to rid it of the last few tears. “You did nothing wrong, Fitz.” Giving him another reassuring smile full of love, she pulled him back into her arms. He returned the hug a bit desperately, his arms around her warm and familiar and comforting and _home_ in a way that she was sure no bloody LMD could ever mimic, no matter how lifelike they were. There was only one Fitz – _her_ Fitz, her best friend, her partner, her love, and not a day too soon, he’d be her husband.

Suddenly, she pulled back from him with wide eyes. Fitz frowned down at her concern, asking hurriedly, “What? What’s wrong, Jemma?”

Feeling just a bit irrational, she clutched his shoulders and whispered, “Marry me.”

Fitz’s frown deepened, and he leaned back a bit as his brow creased with confusion. “Jemma…um…I kinda already asked you that.”

Jemma shook her head quickly at his misunderstanding, and she shook his shoulders, trying to get him to understand. “Marry me. Right _now_.”

His eyebrows shot up to his hairline, and his jaw dropped open in shock. “Right _now_?! Jem, in case you haven’t noticed, we’re in the middle of a bloody battle for our lives!”

“What better time?” Jemma insisted, nearly bouncing in excitement as a wide grin settled over her features. “Fitz, I don’t want to go another moment without being able to call you my husband. We’ve waited far too long already – let’s not waste another single second of time. We’ll find Coulson and he’ll do it, he’ll marry us.”

Fitz swallowed visibly, and he blinked a couple times in apparent disbelief as his eyes scanned her expression, likely looking for doubt or some other reason she’d be proposing this other than all-consuming love and a frantic need to be tied to him forever – but he wouldn’t find it. She was one hundred percent sure of this, of them, of _him_. “Jemma…”

Gripping his face between her hands once more, she went up onto the tips of her toes to press her forehead against his as she beamed up at him. “Let’s get married, Fitz.” Her tone was perhaps a bit too zealous for their current situation, but she didn’t care – she was going to marry Fitz _finally_ , and she would be as excited as she damn well pleased. She deserved that much.

He stared wordlessly at her for another long moment, then she felt him give the tiniest of nods. “Okay,” he whispered. Then, a bit louder and firmer, he said, “Okay, let’s get married.”

Letting out a disbelieving laugh, Jemma pulled him in for a quick but passionate kiss. “We’re getting married.” For a brief moment, they grinned at each other like idiots, but then they separated, snatching the guns they’d abandoned back up and joining hands before taking off in search of Coulson.

After some frenzied searching, they found him in the control room, just taking out a Hunter LMD through a rather cruel beheading. As they entered the room, he whirled on them with a metal pipe in hand. His hard eyes darted over them for a moment, then he solemnly asked Fitz, “What did I say that prompted you to break into a restricted area?”

“You did _what_?” Jemma demanded, whirling on Fitz as her eyebrows rose in disbelief. “When was this?”

Fitz shot her an exasperated glance, then answered Coulson firmly, “You told me to let Jemma go, and I agreed.” His lips quirked up into a humorless smile as he added, “I lied.”

“I got that much,” Coulson replied dryly, lowering the pipe in his hand.

“Did you break into the restricted area that had the _monolith_?” Jemma asked Fitz, all-but ignoring Coulson as she was hit with yet another unintentionally-revealed secret. “Answer me, Leopold Fitz!”

Fitz grimaced, then asked Coulson, “Don’t you…um…need to ask Jemma a question?”

Coulson glanced at Jemma with a smirk, eyeing her tense stance with her hands on her hips and her narrowed eyes focused on Fitz’s profile. “Nah, I think I’m good.”

“Don’t ignore me!” Jemma hissed up at Fitz, and the longer he went on doing so, she felt the truth of it – Fitz had been told to let her go, and he’d attempted to _die_ instead. Just the thought made her feel sick to her stomach, and even though it was far in the past by then, it still broke her heart apart just to imagine it.

Heaving a heavy sigh, Fitz turned to Jemma and murmured, “We’ll talk about that later too, yeah? We did kinda come here for a reason.” Abruptly, his expression faded into sadness and resignation, and he added quietly, “Unless you don’t want to anymore. I’ll…understand, if that’s how you feel.”

“You’re a bloody idiot,” Jemma replied immediately, shaking her head up at him. “I’m so mad at you, for multiple reasons, including the fact that you think _anything_ would stop me from marrying you.”

Fitz’s expression cleared up at that, and he gave her an apologetic smile, catching her hand to give it a quick squeeze before they both turned to face Coulson. He glanced between them, then shook his head with a little, disbelieving smile playing around his lips. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“Please, sir,” Jemma implored him, taking a step closer as Fitz trailed behind her. “I can’t allow another minute to pass without being married to Fitz, and you’re the only one who can help us.”

Coulson let out a huff of laughter, glancing around at the severed, sparking body parts of LMDs that had once had their friends’ faces. Dropping the pipe to the ground beside him, he gave a careless shrug. “I guess today can’t get any weirder.” With that, he ushered Fitz and Jemma closer, shooting a wary look at the open door behind them. “Let’s make this fast, Fitzsimmons.”

“Of course,” Fitz agreed, even as he tightened his grip on Jemma’s hand and they shared a breathless smile, turning to face each other and wrapping their arms loosely around the other.

Coulson cleared his throat, a grin forming on his lips as he started, “Well, I guess we can skip right ahead to the important parts. Do you, Leopold Fitz, take Jemma Simmons as your lawfully wedded wife?”

“I do,” Fitz answered immediately, leaning down to briefly press his forehead against Jemma’s.

“And do you, Jemma Simmons, take Leopold Fitz as your lawfully wedded husband?”

“I do,” Jemma just barely managed to breathe through the happiness welling up inside of her, her eyes already brimming with tears.

“Then, I now pronounce you –”

Coulson’s sentence cut off when a new group of LMDs burst into the room, guns already blazing. Coulson dove for the forgotten pipe as Fitz shoved Jemma behind him and raised his gun to fire back. Jemma yanked him back with her behind the relative safety of a computer terminal, both of them returning fire from there.

Over the din of gunfire and fighting, Coulson shouted over to them, “I now pronounce you husband and wife!” He grunted with exertion as he stabbed the pipe through LMD May’s torso, then spun around and grabbed LMD Bobbi around the throat with his robotic hand, crushing it easily. “You may –” He cut himself off when he ducked to miss a swing from LMD Mack’s axe. Fitz fired off a few rounds, catching LMD Mack in the chest and head, and it collapsed to the ground. Coulson gave him a wave of thanks, swiping a hand over his sweaty brow before he went on, “You may kiss the bride.”

Fitz turned to Jemma, and she held up a finger to tell him to wait as she took aim at the Hunter LMD heading for Coulson, who was currently battling LMD Daisy. “One moment, love.” Once the Hunter LMD had crumpled to the ground and she was sure Coulson had the Daisy LMD – the only one remaining in the room – she dropped her gun, throwing her arms around Fitz and fairly tackling him in a heady kiss.

He dropped back with the force of her weight, just barely catching himself on his hand as his other arm wrapped around her back to keep her close. Regardless, he still returned her kiss heatedly, letting out a little groan of pleasure against her lips as her fingers buried themselves in his hair.

Jemma thought she heard something strange, but she was too far gone, too wrapped up in the pleasant fog that came with kissing Fitz, to really care. Instead, she tilted her head to deepen the kiss, pressing herself closer to him as she moaned against his lips. Fitz was her _husband_. After all these years, after all the hurt and lies and distance and devastation, she and Fitz were _married_. She was absolutely certain that she’d never been happier in her life than she was in that moment.

However, then the jarring sound of a throat loudly being cleared broke through the fog, and she pulled away from the kiss, glancing dazedly up to find Coulson standing awkwardly over them, his eyes on the ceiling. “Sorry Fitzsimmons, but the honeymoon’ll have to wait.”

Jemma’s cheeks flushed with heat, and a glance down told her that Fitz wasn’t in a much better state. But, she took a deep breath and forced herself away from him – but not too far, because she was never letting go of him again. She got to her feet, helping Fitz to his as well, and she pushed all her happiness down deep to be experienced to its full extent later, when they were out of danger. “Understood, sir.”

Coulson finally dropped his eyes, giving them an apologetic smile, then wordlessly lead the way to the door. Fitz moved immediately to follow him, and Jemma hurried to catch up with them, sliding her hand into Fitz’s. He glanced at her, then she felt his fingers lacing with hers as he gave her a secret smile. They may be in the midst of a battle for their lives, and there was every chance in the world that it would go south as soon as they left that room, but Jemma knew that no matter what happened, she was going into it with no regrets. Whatever happened to them from that point on, she could at least be secure in the knowledge that she’d done the one thing she’d wanted to do more than anything else – marry her best friend in the world.


End file.
